Episode
Vinnie Cimino on Building Cleveland's Best Restaurants
- Podcast
- The Perfect Bite
- Published
- May 21, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 2420
- Processing state
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Summary
If you have been sleeping on Cleveland, Chef Vinnie Cimino is here to wake you up. Vinnie is the co-founder of Cordelia, one of Cleveland's most beloved restaurants, and the brand new ROSY, a wood-fired neighborhood spot that opened just seven weeks before this conversation. He is also a three-time James Beard Award nominee, a community anchor through the Cleveland Family Meal Project and Food Conscious, and one of the warmest, most thoughtful voices in the Midwest food scene today. In this episode, host Sarah Perkins sits down with Vinnie for a conversation that covers the full arc of a remarkable career. From a childhood surrounded by big Italian-Slovenian family gatherings and his grandmother's restaurant in Kent, Ohio, to working at Greenhouse Tavern under Jonathon Sawyer, to pop-ups and vagabond cooking during COVID, to answering a mysterious Indeed ad posted by his future co-founder Andrew Watts that simply said he wanted to open the next great Cleveland restaurant. Cordelia, now approaching its fourth year, is exactly what it sounds like: a warm hug. Grandma's dining room meets James Beard-level cooking, with family photos on the walls, vintage 1950s silverware, and a seasonal menu built entirely around what local farm partners bring through the back door. ROSY is Cordelia's sibling, but generationally different: old world techniques, live fire cooking, and an Adriatic and Balkan-inspired menu in a 50-seat neighborhood space where 80% of guests just walk in off the street. And running underneath all of it is Vinnie's guiding philosophy: hospitality starts inward. Take care of your team and they will take care of your guests. It sounds simple. In practice, it looks like buying James Beard Awards tickets for almost 50 members of his staff, rolling out PTO for part…